Unai Emery has revealed that three players could be ready to face Chelsea at the weekend as Aston Villa look to climb the Premier League. The Blues are set to welcome the Villans to Stamford Bridge on Saturday afternoon — a defeat will see Graham Potter's side fall into the bottom half of the table.
Both sides head into the clash on 38 points, with only five goals keeping the west London outfit in the top 10. The last time they met was in a friendly in December when John McGinn gave Villa the lead inside the opening ten minutes.
When they last faced one another competitively, Steven Gerrard was still in charge. Chelsea waltzed away from Villa Park 2-0 victors following two goals from Mason Mount.
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Emery will be desperate to extend his unbeaten run as Villa boss against the Blues, and he's revealed that he could have three new faces in helping him do so. As quoted by Birmingham Live, the 51-year-old said: "Cash is injured and he’ll be out for a couple of weeks or maybe more.
"Hopefully it’s less than three weeks but, more or less, this injury is going normally with the player three weeks, more or less. Coutinho is still injured. He’s progressing but not yet to train with us.
"[Boubacar] Kamara, this week, was training with us and, if tomorrow he’s ready, I think I can use him in the squad to use him in the match on Saturday," Emery added. "[Leandro] Dendoncker as well has trained with us for the last two weeks normally and is ready to play.
"Diego Carlos played last week with the Under-21s and with us, 60 minutes, with Bristol Rovers. He's ready to train normally every day. To play a match, he's ready to play some minutes but not in the starting XI yet. But this week he's progressed well.
"We'll watch him on the pitch in the next few days. No other player has problems. Everyone is OK and hopefully tomorrow we can train normally and be ready for Saturday."
Emery was then asked what he expects from Graham Potter following a turbulent start to life at Chelsea. The Villa boss said: "Chelsea, of course, are a candidate to be in the top four but after 28 matches they aren’t.
"They have very good players, the coach is amazing. He did amazing at Brighton and he needs time to adapt his ideas at Chelsea. Progressively, they’re doing better and better. We are in the same position.
"We are still 11th but we’re close with the same points as Chelsea. We’re close to the other teams, like Fulham, Brentford and Brighton, and we are excited about getting them and to be closer to them."
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